WeisserTee

I have nothing against booking.com and have used them successfully many times in the past. Nonetheless, I now make nearly all my bookings directly with the hotel.

There are various reasons...certain properties are places we have stayed at before and I like the personal rapport developed with the staff. This has occasionally translated into a discounted rate or complimentary upgrade, but I do not assume that I will get those. Sometimes it means I can easily book a specific room in my rate category, esp at independently owned properties.

I also like that my entire payment is going to the hotel rather than a cut (around 15 percent, I believe) going to booking.com. This is esp important for smaller non-chain hotels that have struggled during the pandemic and need every franc, euro, whatever they can get.

No right or wrong, just our personal preferences.

chepar

A long time ago (around 2007) I had a somewhat unpleasant experience booking a hotel in Paris through booking.com. Upon checking into the hotel, I found the room rate was going to be about 10 euros higher per night than what I had booked on my reservation through booking.com. I had printed out my reservation confirmation and showed it to the front desk clerk (this was a small 3* hotel) and they refused to honor the confirmation price, basically shrugging their shoulders and saying take it or leave it.

I was traveling with my parents and daughter and on the tail third end of a three week trip - so I was in no mood to go searching for new hotel rooms at that point, so I just agreed to pay the added cost, but the experience left a bad taste in my mouth.

However I will say that was the only time I have ever had a hotel not honor the room rate through a third party booking site and I do use them fairly frequently.

whitehall

Ten or so years ago, we owned a large lodging property. We used third party sites to offer discounted rates during slower periods, since most of the takers were people we might not have otherwise found. As someone noted, we simply did not want to hurt our brand and discount on our own website. Most of our regulars loyally booked on our website, and yes, in return, we charged them full price. We made up for it with doubly good service, including upgrades when possible, to these regulars.

With regard to booking.com, although we still use them when it is convenient for US, we were disappointed during Covid when they failed to assist us in getting back deposits from a couple of struggling hotels, even when we cancelled within the allowed time frame. “Customer service” simply stopped responding to us, and we had to rely on our credit card to rescue us. We book a lot of airbnbs. Many of the same places are now on booking.com, and a few times, we have discovered the same place significantly cheaper on one or the other, perhaps because many of these owners are amateurs and have difficulty navigating the differing commission and fee structures. Or, maybe one allows an owner easier discounting. In this continuing Covid era, we have found airbnb offering more discounts and more favorable cancellation policies than say VRBO. So, it pays to compare, even apartments.

girlonthego

I mostly use booking.com and trip advisor sites to get information on the hotels, reviews, pricing and then book directly with the hotel. Most of the time, the pricing is similar. The big chain hotels, we belong to most of the loyalty programs and have status with a couple of them, so I definitely like to book directly with them. Some smaller hotels, I also have booked directly with and hopefully that got us a better room?
Twice, I have used booking.com, once in Greece and once in Montreal, and I was pleased with the rooms we were given and also the better rate we got. One was a big chain hotel and one was a smaller hotel. So, I guess it pays to shop around and see who gives the best deal.
In the past, I was always afraid if I used booking.com, I would wind up in the basement room with no windows but it did not happen to me in the two times i used them.

BritishCaicos

Search on booking.com , pick the phone up and speak to a nice person on the other end of the phone.

The prices are usually the same but the business owner saves 15%.

Does this damage booking.com’s business model - yes.

Would I lose sleep over it - No.

if the person on the other end of the phone isn’t nice then don’t book, who needs reviews ...do your own research.

mjs

I check both Booking.com and the hotel websites. Sometimes one can get an extra like breakfast or parking by going direct.

LunaBella

I don't usually make reservations through a third-party booking agent, for various reasons.

But here's one IMPORTANT reason: I have had hotel managers tell me that often times third party booking agents overbook hotels. I have heard of this in the past and then just had direct experience with this a few weeks ago in Leavenworth, Washington, USA. I booked a room directly with the hotel. A few days before my sister and I were to arrive, the hotel called me and asked me if I would be willing to change rooms (from two double beds to one double bed), as their hotel was overbooked for my nights. When I got to the hotel and discussed the situation with the manager, she said they were overbooked due to third-party agents overbooking, and that's why that particular hotel always puts a hold for one night on the credit card of guests who book directly. Somehow in their system that gives these guests priority over those who reserve through a search engine like booking.com. So, I got to keep my reservation as-is by booking directly with the hotel. I don't know what happened for the other folks who didn't.

Another example I just ran into two days ago: I was looking to possibly book a hotel in Croatia via the points on my Chase credit card. Via the Chase site, it showed that a certain hotel in Dubrovnik had availability and it would have let me book a room. However before I finalized the booking with Chase I went directly to the hotel's website, which showed they were completely full for my dates.

The bottom line for me: third-party sites are great for searching and comparing, but I do not trust them. If I have to use one (for example two years ago a small, cheap hotel I wanted to stay at in Braga, Portugal didn't have its own website and requested that reservations be made through booking.com), I will follow up directly with the hotel and make sure we agree on price, my reservation is in their system, etc, so there are no surprises.

balthy

ALL hotels overbook, booking method does not matter. I can give you several examples of direct bookings where the hotel did not have a room for me - nothing to do with booking through a booking site. At the end of the day, the hotel controls the inventory.

LunaBella

But in my case booking method DID matter Balthy.

Traveler_Nick

No the hotel told you it did . That doesn't mean anything really. The hotels will always blame somebody else. The booking agent. The weather. The government. They know that you're standing there and the other party can't defend themselves. They're counting on you believing what they're saying.

Booking.com and all the rest don't control the hotel inventory. If there is an overbooking that's 100% the fault of the hotel. The hotel either didn't keep an eye on things or they intentionally overbooked. Either way it's the hotel.

Or ask yourself this. With every booking the hotel more or less instantaneously receives the booking request. Why didn't they refuse the booking at that point? Or any time between the booking and the stay? They knew you had a booking.

BTW the no show hold is pretty common no matter how you book. Depending on what you booked you might even be charged in advance.

LunaBella

Okay so the takeaways according to Traveler_Nick are: Hotel workers are all liars. My real-life experience is apparently not worth relating.

Also the hotel can't speak, and it didn't tell me anything. The manager I spoke with told me what they were dealing with, in that first specific instance I used as an example of why I don't use these sites. I have seen and heard of similar issues happen with friends and family (bookings getting lost, etc). In my opinion there are too many mix-ups when using third-party sites. And frankly I don't care whose fault it is. If I show up jet-lagged after travelling a full day around the world, I want a room to be waiting for me on the other side, end of story.

BTW I know the no show hold is common, and there is no need to be condescending. I travel all of the time and all over the world. Not using third-party booking sites. To each his own, and back to discussing the pros and cons of third-party sites based on our experience or preferences.

mlgb

In my expericence I cannot say that booking direct vs booking.com is always better or always worse in terms of price. Sometimes the prices are the same, especially if you layer a Genius price with a sale for an extra % off. Sometimes using a hotel website and a member or Senior pricing will be better (or at least the same) as the booking or hotels.com price. The one hotel chain that seems consistently better if booked direct is Motel 6 which is a (very) low end chain in the US, similar to Accor (and once owned by them).

However my most recent trip to Texas I tried to check in at the wrong hotel at 11pm on a sold-out Saturday night! Fortunately despite the very long day I eventually figured out that I had cancelled the first hotel and had forgotten to update spreadsheets. So there is definitely an advantage of keeping all of your bookings in one place!!

Dislcaimer, I only use booking for hotels/motels, not for apartments.

Percy

I have always booked directly with the hotel.

They send mean e-mail confirmation and I am done.!!

If I have any problem , it is directly with the hotel.

I once booked the Marriott in Brussels and when I arrived they did not have my room, they told me.

They said I should have been there on March 16th !!?

I said no I booked for April 16th and here I am.

The guy said "We have a Convention here and we are pretty booked up".

I said well I have a room for April 16th for four days.

I was looking through my carry on bag for the e-mail confirmation when he asked if I knew

who took my booking !!

I said I sure do we just exchanged e-mails two days ago and her name is Joan XYZ, and that's her right there in the manager's office.!
She came out and apologized and offered to move me up into a small suite, which I turned down because I did not need a suite.
She said then we will give you full breakfast every morning and an evening cocktail in the Lounge.

That I took.

I wonder if I had booked through a company what would have transpired .

In all my travels world wide ,I have always booked directly with the hotel.

I prefer to deal directly always

LunaBella

What Percy said. And also the less people involved, the less chance for error I would imagine.

johnmaels5401

I use online booking everytime and everywhere.

Traveler_Nick

I'm saying the hotel tried to deflect blame for their own actions. If what you believe is true the hotel is at the very least grossly incompetent allowing third parties to sell rooms that don't exist and not even warning the guests. Or worse they're part of some sort of fraud. I think lying is the least of their crimes.

You brought up the no show fee claiming it was something the hotel did and the booking sites didn't. I wasn't the one who told you that. Who ever told you that was condescending.

michael_cain_77398

I haven't had many bad experiences with booking hotels in general, but I'd say those times are pretty evenly distributed between when I used a third-party, and when I booked directly. There was one memorable trip to Egypt where I booked everything independently ... and everything seemed to go wrong, from Cairo down to Aswan. And then there was the hotel in Tunis with great reviews that turned out to be a brothel. It would have been really nice to have used booking.com for those trips.

billirandall

Yes, you are right.

russ_in_LA

95% of the bookings I make are apartments/vacation rentals. These usually don't have a direct method of booking and, even if they did, it would be difficult and time consuming to look through them all. I check Booking.com, AirBnB and VRBO, and don't often find a variation in pricing, but I do see a wide variation in cancellation policies. I recently booked an apartment which stated no refund at any time on Booking.com, but by booking direct (they are marketed like a hotel but all rooms are apartments), I was able to book with full refund if cancelled up to 14 days before arrival. I suspect in this case they were using Booking.com as advertising, listing it with a strict cancellation policy in order to drive people to their website. I guess it worked!

For 1 night stays, I usually book hotels, in which case, all things being equal, I tend to use booking.com for the convenience of having them all in one place, so long as they are fully refundable up to 24 hours before arrival. The only time I ever had a problem was with a hotel I booked direct, but in 40 years of travel, that's bound to happen at some point.

Macross

In Europe I am an ACCOR member so go through them. Our Paris hotel is ACCOR so they honoured my voucher and never charged me more when I rebooked. In US we use Hilton mostly so book with them. I use Airbnb direct.